Hugh Johnson says "It's the ultimate wine library ..." The second edition contains nearly 8,000 entries, approximately 150% more text and entries than the 1985 first edition. There are thousands of annotations covering everything wine has touched: art, literature, music, history, food, winemaking, grape growing, poetry, politics, religion, and war. It also contains hundreds of biographical sketches of the men and women who pioneered wine's development and recorded its history. In addition to the author index, there is an alphabetically arranged Short-Title Index and a Subject Index (new to this edition).

Dr. Kevin Starr, State Librarian of California, writes in the Introduction, "No one in the world of wine has achieved anything approaching the perfection, the comprehensiveness of James Gabler's masterful harvest of English-language wine-related items.... Certainly, this is a most valuable book for the world of wine ..."

Robert Mondavi pays it a high compliment saying, "It's a must for all wine lovers."

Robert M. Parker, Jr. says "It's a prodigious and essential achievement, in addition to being a fascinating historical reference ..."

"Gabler deserves praise and recognition first and foremost for his comprehensiveness. I am astonished by the scope and breath of his achievement.... I pitted Gabler head to head with the most comprehensive library catalog in the known universe, OCLC, and Gabler won easily.... Gabler also deserves praise for the excellence of his annotations: they state what you need to know, clearly and with elegance."Wayward Tendrils Quarterly,Bo Simons, Wine LibrarianSonoma County Wine Library, Sonoma County, CA

"From Pliny to Parker, if a book about wine has been published in English, it will almost certainly be described in this magisterial bibliography..."Wine Lovers PageRobin Garr, Editor

"Wine into Words remains an indispensable reference work. It has the additional advantage of being a book that a reader can browse through at length because the annotations and biographies ranging from literature and music to history and art are such a pleasure to read."Wine EastHudson Cattell, Editor

The review in the April 2004 issue of Choice concluded, "A key reference book by a noted authority in the field. Summing Up: Highly recommended."